LIVE: BRIAN CADD, Fremantle – 18th July 2024

The Duke Of George, Fremantle, Western Australia

Reviewed by Shane Pinnegar

 

Jason Ayres opens proceedings with an acoustic guitar, a passionate voice, and a solid collection of singer/songwritery tunes Lie Lie Lie, Desire, Bruce Springsteen’s On Fire – here given a Nashville country makeover, and best of all the tender Through The Rain – about being the last one standing in a lifelong relationship, before closing with Let The Wild River Run.

 

It’s all very pleasant and garners a good response and a few enthusiastic whoops thrown in for good measure, but there’s no doubt who the packed house are here to see and hear.

 

The intimate confines of The Duke Of George – all exposed brick, supper-club table seating, lounge chairs and warm colours & character – are mostly populated by a certain generation of people to whom Brian Cadd needs absolutely no introduction. He’s soundtracked our lives, loves and families from the mid-Sixties, and is still making fantastic music as evidenced by his recent albums including this year’s country & western Dream Train.

 

After almost sixty years in the business Cadd knows how to work an audience: it’s not just great songs played well, he works the crowd, jokes affectionately with them and shares anecdotes and asides. Keep ‘em smiling and grooving may as well be his motto.

 

We’ve grown up listening to and loving his songs, so there’s plenty for him to talk and joke about – not only his storied career, but also his childhood growing up in Perth – and we’re more than happy to be conducted to clap and sing along from the second song, Axiom’s wonderful Arkansas Grass.

 

Every era of Cadd’s career is revisited: 1966-69 singles Such A Lovely Way and Woman You’re Breaking Me from his time with The Groop; ‘69-70’s period with Axiom , such as their final single My Baby’s Gone; and solo hits including The One That Got Away and You Know What To Say from the newly minted Australian Country Number One album Dream Train.

 

Cadd’s familiar golden rasp is like an old, well-worn comfort blanket – a little rougher than it used to be, but no less reassuring for it – and he really is the master of a huge heartfelt broken-hearted ballad.

 

Slow Rock changes the pace to something more bluesy and schmoove than much of his work, guitarist Pete Robinson given room to shine with a smokin’ solo, drummer John Creech the impassive Charlie Watts mainstay of the outfit.

 

Everybody’s Leaving tugs at the heartstrings with it’s lament for losing our idols and friends, and a meaningful positive message about how they’re never truly gone as long as we have their music or our memories of them.

 

If there’s a better song about a new-born baby girl than Little Ray Of Sunshine, I am yet to hear it, and being able to enjoy it live with my own seventeen year old daughter – the very first song she heard, aged about one hour old in the maternity ward – was indescribably special for us both.

 

Cadd’s 1972 smash Ginger Man is another highlight before getting the crowd on their feet to finish with a spirited cover of Your Mama Don’t Dance and a rock n’ roll medley built around “the greatest rock n’ roll song ever written”, Honky Tonk Women. 

 

Cadd gave the crowd exactly what they wanted and needed – great music written and played from the heart by an old favourite, and nobody could have left expecting any more than that.

 

Set List:

 

Makin’ Love In The Eye Of A Hurricane

Arkansas Grass

Don’t You Know It’s Magic

Such A Lovely Way

Woman You’re Breaking Me

The One That Got Away

My Baby’s Gone

Let Go

Slow Rock

You Know What To Say

Alvin Purple

Everybody’s Leaving

A Little Ray Of Sunshine

Ginger Man

Your Mama Don’t Dance

Rock n’ Roll Medley:

Honky Tonk Woman

Gloria

Walkin’ The Dog

Hang On Sloopy

(Can’t Get No) Satisfaction